She's With Me

8

By the time I'm done with all of the interviews, my stomach is rumbling uncontrollably. I hope that there's some leftover lasagna from earlier in the kitchen. Heading in there, I only see Miss Textalot, I mean Rochelle. She lifts her head up to acknowledge my presence and smiles. I don't know why she's here anyway. It's not like we're in need of the servers at the moment. The restaurant is closed.

"I was just leaving," as though she'd read my mind, she walks out of the kitchen without turning back. She seems to have accomplished something that she'd aimed for from the look on her face.

Then I see Elijah walking out of the pantry fixing his collar and running his fingers through his hair. It's almost five in the afternoon, and while I was doing interviews, he was training the other chefs to be compatible with him in the kitchen. He knows a thing or two that they don't, especially since they had such a crappy executive chef before him.

"You can leave when you're ready. Be here bright and early tomorrow morning," I spot the pan of lasagna on the counter and head over, but it's empty. Fuck.

"Hungry?" He takes off his chef jacket and hangs it up. I take a good look at him, noticing a lot of things that I hadn't before—like how muscular his arms are, and how he has a dimple on his chin, including on the sides of his cheeks.

"Starving actually," I place my hand over my stomach, as his eyes move over my small figure. I wouldn't say that I'm tiny, but I'm definitely petite. Poppy can lift me up and spin me around our living room for a whole five minutes without breaking a sweat. She's got great upper body strength, and it's so freaking sexy.

"Me too," he drops his eyes to the floor and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jeans, "I was gonna grab an early dinner. You can join me if you want," he lifts his head up, "there's this great Italian restaurant that I want to try."

It's odd for me to leave one restaurant, which I own, to grab dinner at a next. But I don't mind indulging in someone else's cuisine. It'll give me ideas on how I want to set mine up.

"Sure. I don't have anything to do anyway," I head to my office and grab my things, before meeting him at the reservation desk.

"You ready?"

"Yeah, let me just lock up," when I'm done, and satisfied that no one might break in, even though there's security cameras all over, we begin our walk to the restaurant. It's only a few streets down, and the late afternoon air is nice to dwell in.

"So where are you from?" He asks, as we walk side by side. I smile and continue to look ahead.

"Chicago."

"Really?" I already know what he's going to say next, "me too, what a coincidence."

I sigh and take a glance at him. I know so much about him and he knows little to nothing about me.

"Yeah."

"My mom's birthday is coming up, so I'm taking a trip there next month," I also know that his birthday was only a week ago, and that he turned thirty-five.

"Are you asking for a few days off already?" I raise my brow, not that I cared too much. I'd just get another chef to fill in for him. Am I being too lenient? I mean, who lets their executive chef take time off without a few months notice? He's extremely important and necessary, and things might just go haywire without him...

"I wish I could, but I know better. I'll leave late Saturday night and fly back late Sunday night. We don't open on Sundays, right?" We don't? Oh yeah, I've decided to hold off Sundays until we get a good brunch menu. Plus, I want Sundays to be able to visit Poppy back in New York.